I’m finding myself having a distinctly bifurcated reaction to the death of Robert Trump. We’ve all been socialized, of course, to be kind when somebody dies. I initially posted something on Facebook about how the “wrong Trump died,” which is beyond argument.¹ But it was also unkind. So I took it down.

First of all, Robert Trump, like all the rest of his siblings, was also a grifter. That much is clear from reading his niece Mary Trump’s book, where she details how the surviving Trump siblings tried to screw her and her brother out of their inheritance. As if they all weren’t inheriting enough money from Papa Fred already. Screwing the niece and nephew was just the frosting on the cake for this family of grifters, who also clearly engaged in tax fraud.² Robert was also the lead plaintiff in the suit against Mary Trump, trying to squelch her book. A suit which, as we all know now, did not succeed.

Secondly, whatever natural sympathy I might once have had for the Trump family has evaporated a long time ago. Robert was reportedly much nicer and less blustery than the Donald, but that’s setting the bar awfully low. Whatever remaining sympathy I might have once had was completely eviscerated by the 150,000 lives we’ve squandered since the pandemic for no good reason at all.

The Donald reported that Robert was his “best friend”³, and apparently he actually visited him at the hospital on Friday night. And then on Saturday the Donald went golfing while his brother lay dying.

No cause of death has been given. It’s my prediction that we will eventually find out that Robert died of covid-19. All the indicia are there. The hospitalization, the move to intensive care, the quick deterioration, for a man who had previously been identified as healthy. It doesn’t sound like a heart attack. If it does turn out to be covid-19, that will be especially embarrassing for the Donald, given that the Donald keeps promising us all that the virus will just magically “disappear” one of these days.

1. Apparently #wrongtrump was even trending on Twitter.
2. Tax fraud is, in part, what the New York District Attorney Cyrus R. Vance Jr. is investigating right now, and where the Supreme Court recently decided that he should be able to get access to the tax records that he subpoeaned. See Trump v. Vance, 591 U.S. ___ (2020).
3. It is unlikely that Robert was the Donald’s “best friend,” as the Donald has repeatedly been reported not to have any friends, and because Robert makes almost no appearances in Trump’s various biographies. There is no evidence that Robert played a big role in the Donald’s life.